


AWAE Ficlets

by yukiawison



Series: Ficlet Collections [6]
Category: Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-13
Packaged: 2019-10-09 14:42:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17408825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yukiawison/pseuds/yukiawison
Summary: Anne with an E ficlets from Tumblr.(1-4 from ficvember 2018.)





	1. Flowers

**Author's Note:**

> Hey there, these are from my (kind of) failed challenge to post a fic/ficlet every day in November.

Anne filled the apartment with flowers when Gilbert wasn’t looking. There were vases of lilies and roses on the coffee table and in the window sill and nestled between the coffee maker and toaster in their tiny kitchenette.

Gilbert loved the apartment. He loved that they’d paid for it together, pooling his money left over from odd jobs once he’d paid his med school bills for the semester and hers from her teaching salary. It wasn’t much but it was theirs, and Anne had a way of making everything beautiful.

She made them both coffee in the morning, and insisted that they each slow down enough to sit across from each other at the table and give a brief rundown of the day ahead. Before he left she would kiss him and on particularly exciting mornings she’d make them toast and babble on eagerly as the morning sun shown though the thin curtains.

Today Anne was asleep on the couch with a book in her hand. He’d just come in from class and had stopped in the doorway to look at her. She looked so peaceful with her bright hair in a halo around her freckled forehead. Her face was flushed like the day when he asked her to move in with him. He’d tallied up all the ways he was responsible and could demonstrate his ability to support them (his job at the clinic between classes, his savings from years at the hardware store in Avonlea, the circled apartment listings in his paper), but all Anne cared about was that he loved her. It was written all over his face and in the way he held his breath before she agreed.

The flowers made the living room smell sweet and warm. On weekends when it rained they’d slow dance in the living room with only Anne’s flowers as their audience.

Every day wasn’t perfect. Sometimes Anne woke in the middle of the night mid-gasp, afraid of something Gilbert couldn’t see. Sometimes they fought about dirty dishes or missed calls when they were both exhausted. But someone would always apologize and life would go back to comfortable and normal.

Gilbert Blythe was lucky. Anne shifted on the couch and her eyes fluttered open. She looked up at him and smiled in the tired but open way that was distinctly hers. Gilbert’s chest felt full.

Anne sat up. The setting sun was turning her whole form a deep orange. He wanted to look at her like that forever. She said what she always said, but it felt important every time she said it.

“Welcome home,” Anne said.


	2. Fever

It was raining. Gilbert Blythe was barely conscious but he could hear the heavy patter of raindrops on the windows. He rolled onto his side and blinked, blearily. His brain was slow with sleep and the flu that was still having its way with him. If he lied very still his head would stop pounding for a moment or two. He tried to focus the scraps of his attention on something productive.

What was Anne doing right now? When he was well they’d argue about books on the schoolhouse steps at lunch. She’d goaded him into reading  _Jane Eyre_. He’d finished it late at night, after a week of reading in bed, eyelids drooping from the exhaustion of the day. It was important to her, and so it was worth it.

Anne knew more about literature than he did. She was the storyteller. Her eyes lit up with surprise and interest and passion.

Gilbert hated missing school for being sick. At least when he was aboard the steamer his absence spelled freedom. He could stand on the deck and look out at the blue-green waves and taste the salt in the air. He would have to impart this image to Anne some time, she collected pretty things: things like Marilla’s smile from the kitchen doorway when Anne came home from school, or Diana’s tight hugs. She had explained all this one afternoon and he asked her if he was a part of this collection of moments. She said he was, reluctantly, the day he showed up in the schoolhouse when she’d least expected it. He remembered her short hair, messily cropped and concealed with a bow. He remembered how pretty she looked, even when her face was red with embarrassment and vulnerability.

Gilbert felt his eyes close again. He wondered if Anne missed him today.

“Gil?” Her voice was soft and distant , but woke him with a jolt. Anne Shirley-Cuthbert stood in his bedroom doorway.

He tried to sit up but stopped when she inched closer to the bed.

“I came to check in,” she said. “I’m sorry I came inside without your answering the door. It was unlocked and I figured you were asleep.”

“How long have you been waiting?” he asked, suddenly self-conscious about the drool at the edge of his mouth and wild tangle of his dark hair.

“Not long,” she said. “I brought you some of Marilla’s brilliant ginger cookies and your schoolwork for when you return,” she said. He watched her watch him, eyes lingering on his flushed appearance and tired eyes. “How are you, Gilbert?”

“I could be better,” he said. “And thank you.”

“Well,” she began, striding toward the bed and taking a seat on the floor beside it. “I can fill you in on all the gossip while you were gone, as well as give you my opinion of Jane’s initial resistance to her romantic hero. Oh I do hope you’ll be back soon, Gil. It’s boring without you.”

“It is?” He asked. He was in the faraway, feverish space where everything felt warm and heavy on his eyelids. Anne’s hair was in loose braids over her shoulders. He liked when her braids began to unravel. The stray red strands were transfixing in the autumn breeze. He didn’t go near her braids after the initial fiasco, but he thought about how soft they must be.

“Yes,” Anne said. “It’s terribly boring.” She turned to him and her eyes met his. She smiled. “So get well soon.”


	3. (Not) a Love Letter

Dear Gilbert,

I think it’s unfair that you left without a proper goodbye to everyone at school. Ruby and the others miss you terribly, and I told them every detail you told me. I think they understand. I do, at least.

I also find it painfully unfair that you get to see the world before I do. I suppose I’ve been behind my whole life (in finding a home, in math, in friendship), but I feel we should be equals in all things, if we are to be true friends.

Tell me about the things you see and the people you meet. It will keep me from missing you if you tell me of the grand time you’re having, tasting the salty air, reaching distant ports where no one knows a thing about the likes of Avonlea and you become a new person: a mysterious nomad of the waters.

I don’t miss you all too terribly, I mean. I’m not pained by your absence so don’t flatter yourself, Gilbert Blythe.

I wish I knew where you were at this instant. I wish I knew you were safe and well and coming home soon. But I don’t even know where to send this letter.

So I won’t send it. I’ll just fold it up and keep it in my desk for the drama of it. I can let you read it when you’re home again.

Please come home again.

Yours faithfully,

Anne Shirley-Cuthbert

Dear Anne,

I’m coming back to Avonlea. I don’t want to tell you. I can’t. If I’m being honest (and since no one but myself will read this I suppose I can be) I’m afraid you won’t be happy to see me. I’m afraid the distance between us will have stretched so long and thin that you won’t see me anymore.

I can’t stop seeing you. The waves are harsh at night. They crash and the ship sways and I can’t sleep. I close my eyes, just to try, and your face is there. You’re smiling at me and all I see are freckles. I didn’t think I’d miss Avonlea the way I do. I thought that every piece of it would be tangled up in how I feel about my father. Everything would be tainted with loneliness and cold, like that winter, and thinking of Avonlea would sting like frostbite.

But I miss you. I miss your Avonlea, Anne. I miss standing beside you in the schoolhouse and hearing you spell. I miss your stories and your hair in the morning, lit up in gold and wild from the walk to school. I miss Green Gables. I miss passing by and looking up at your window, hoping. I even miss holding all my words inside, fighting the urge to tell you everything I like about you whenever you smile.

But what if you’re not happy to see me? What if when I’m home everything is tough in the way that drains the life out of you? What if I’m lonely every day and no one notices?

I’m coming home, Anne. I’m counting the days. I’m writing pointless letters and singing the old farm songs quietly, so I don’t wake Bash and the others.

I’ll see you soon. I hope you want to see me.

Yours always,

Gilbert Blythe


	4. Favorite

He found her laying in the grass, among the wildflowers, of course, where she belonged. He was happier to see her than she was to see him.

“Gil-what are you doing here?” She exclaimed, brows furrowing. She didn’t sit up. He stood over her with his hands in his pockets and an amused expression. His curls flopped over his forehead and Anne held her breath. He had no right to look so effortless, to match the creamy white clouds and bright sunshine.

“What are  _you_  doing here?” He repeated back to her. “I asked for you at the house and Miss Cuthbert said you were off on one of your adventures.”

“This is an adventure in progress, Gilbert Blythe. Use your imagination. I thought you were Diana,” she said, frowning.

He grinned as she stretched her arms and legs out, making a snow angel shape, though the air was warm.

“Why did you come asking for me? Do you need a spelling lesson? I’ll happily oblige.”

“No, I uh…” He felt his face flush. Anne noticed. She sat up and smoothed fiery strands of hair from her face.

“What is it?”

“I wanted to ask you if you’d accompany me to a party.”

“A party?”

“In Charlottetown. I’ve been working as an apprentice at a medical practice and I’ve been invited to…well it’ll be all doctors and nurses so I understand if you aren’t interested. But I thought…” he stopped, staring down at his feet.

“What did you think, Gilbert?” She asked. Anne didn’t consider herself the perfect party guest, at Miss Barry’s was one thing, but on the arm of Gilbert Blythe? She wouldn’t belong.

“I thought I should bring my favorite person in Avonlea,” he said quietly. “If you don’t mind my saying.”

When they were younger, back when he stared at her from across the school house and once teased her enough for a slate to the head, he wouldn’t have dared to tell her this. Though, from the moment he met Anne he knew, somehow, that she would be immeasurably important to him.

Anne stood, brushing the grass from her dress and stepping into his space. He could feel her warm breath as she collected herself.

“I don’t mind at all,” she said.


End file.
